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DEI efforts have ramped up nationwide in professional and educational settings, but for African-born surgeon and Harvard graduate Dr. Nche Zama the push for inclusion in the medical field is unsettling.
Joining forces with conservative anti-DEI activist Kenny Xu, Zama spoke on a panel in Chapel Hill aimed at forcing the University of North Carolina‘s medical school to rethink its inclusive practices.
“The most important issue should be educational excellence but it’s the one thing missing in all these DEI policies,” Zama, who immigrated to the United States at age 14, said. With the help of Zama, Xu’s efforts were successful. UNC’s medical school has disbanded its DEI task force and has no plans to implement its recommendations now or in the future, according to the New York Post.
The school’s DEI task force, which was formed in 2019, completed its work in 2020, according to the school. However, Xu claimed that the institution had taken part in “unconscious bias training” and “racially-preferential admissions” since then, according to the paper.
Zama is on board with the thinking of Xu’s group Color Us United, which feels that a focus on diversity rather than academic meritocracy is dangerous in medical schools.
“If you’re promoting numerical equity based on having a certain number of minorities or disadvantaged people and you’re allowing them into medical school based on that, they’re not going to be prepared for what is a very competitive environment,” Zama said. “Health care is the most important thing on this planet and to lower the standards to satisfy a policy is unfair to the patient and to the doctor who may not have the level of confidence and ability he or she should have because of these policies. DEI has drowned out what real diversity should look like.”
Zama’s stern approach may come from a personal connection to saving lives as his book, Mommy Please Don’t Die, details the death of his mother in childbirth, which led to his coming to the United States to pursue a medical degree.